1,000 flee after tsunami rumors
ILOILO CITY—A false tsunami alert threw into panic more than a thousand survivors of Supertyphoon “Yolanda” in northern Antique province, who fled from their homes early on Sunday amid fears they would be swallowed by huge waves.
Broderick Train, executive officer of the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, said fleeing coastal residents were reported in the towns of Sebaste, Culasi and Pandan. These towns were among the hardest hit by the Supertyphoon.
“People are still traumatized and very sensitive to information like this. We are trying to convince them that there is no tsunami and to return to their homes,” Train told the Inquirer.
He said the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology had dismissed the report of a tsunami, a series of huge waves usually triggered shortly after a very strong underwater earthquake or volcanic eruption.
Train said they were still determining the source of the false information that officials said spread like wildfire through text messages.
Kurt Owen Vedeja of Barangay (village) Naba in Culasi said his family was roused from their sleep at 2 a.m. by a day-care worker, who urged them to evacuate to safer grounds.
“We brought candles, some clothes, food and a flashlight. When we went out, there were already many people on the highway on their way to upland villages,” Vedeja told the Inquirer in a telephone interview.
He said he left their dogs to watch over their padlocked house.
Residents from all walks of life sought safer grounds in Paningayon, Salde and Simbola, and other mountainous villages.
Most took tricycles. Others brought their cars but left them when the road became inaccessible to large vehicles.
“One pregnant woman was afraid she was going to give birth prematurely,” Vedeja, 25, said.
Vedeja’s family returned to their house on Sunday morning after police made the rounds convincing people that the tsunami alarm was false. But he said some evacuees who brought tents opted not to return to their homes for another day.
There were various accounts on where the false alarm started, including from the Internet. “There were text messages that an 8.8-magnitude earthquake would happen,” Vedeja said.
In Culasi, about 90 kilometers north of the capital town of San Jose, around a thousand residents of coastal villages fled from their homes to upland villages, said Mayor Joel Lumogdang.
He said residents walked or rode vehicles to upland villages about 5 to 7 km from the shoreline.
Thirty of the town’s 44 villages lie along the coast.
“Most of the evacuees have refused to return home because they believed a tsunami would hit by 5 p.m. on Sunday,” Lumogdang said by phone on Sunday morning.
Municipal officials and police have been going to the evacuation areas to dispute the reports and convince the people to go home.
“We are also concerned of the security of their houses and belongings because some villages were totally abandoned,” the mayor said.
Attempts to refute the false reports have been hampered due to the nonoperation of the town’s community radio station because of the continuing power blackout, the mayor said.
Officials have asked the San Jose-based dyKA radio station to air information correcting the false alarm.
In Sebaste, 110 km north of San Jose, residents of Aguila were roused from their sleep early on Sunday by panicking neighbors.
They hastily gathered belongings and evacuated along the national highway or mountainous villages, said Insp. Winnie Andico, the town’s police chief.
“We could not stop them and they were afraid they would be swallowed by huge waves,” Andico said.
Residents of seven other coastal village of Sebaste also evacuated. Most started returning to their homes only at 7 a.m. on Sunday, he said.
Around 200 residents of two villages in Pandan also evacuated due to the false alarm, according to Pandan Mayor Jonathan Tan.
The residents returned to their houses on Sunday morning after police convinced them that the tsunami report was baseless, the mayor said.
